Well, happy Palm Sunday and Master Sunday.
Equally religious holidays for most of you.
And for especially those that aren't here, because they just can't, right?
Like because Master Sunday is just that important that they need to be preparing at home with Live from the Masters, which apparently is just like eight hours of reviewing yesterday and making sort of aimless forecasting for what will happen later today.
That's what Live from the Masters is.
As I've been watching it every day, doing that also.
So we're going to jump right into the Palm Sunday text where Jesus is entering Jerusalem, headed to the cross, Good Friday, thinking of resurrection Sunday, next Sunday.
Luke 19, verse 28.
And when he had said these things, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.
When he drew near to Beth Page and Bethany at the mount that is called Olivet, he sent two of the disciples, saying, Go into the village in front of you, where on entering you will find a colt tied on which no one has ever yet sat, untie it and bring it here.
If anyone asks you, Why are you untying it, you shall say, This, the Lord has need of it.
So those who were sent away found it just as he had told them.
And as they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, Why are you untying the colt?
And they said, The Lord has need of it.
And they brought it to Jesus, throwing their cloaks on the colt.
They sat, they sat Jesus on it.
So a few points.
Point number one is this is Jesus is the humble king, compassionate and gentle to us.
Jesus is the humble king, compassionate and gentle to us.
Listen to the humility in these two verses about Jesus.
John 10, 11, I am the good shepherd.
The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
Hebrews 4, 15.
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
So the way to say that in the positive, it would be Christ can sympathize with us.
So Jesus is on the Mount of Olives.
It's a two-mile ridge, about 300 feet above the city of Jerusalem.
And they bring him a donkey, a symbol of peace, right?
Not a war horse, not prestige, but a donkey, humble.
Right?
Jesus is relational, he's compassionate.
Maybe you remember last October when the Braves were in the World Series, right?
And suddenly people like me became fans for eight days.
I was an eight-day fan.
Somebody told me this morning the Braves season started.
Didn't know.
Didn't know it started.
I probably was not going to be aware of that until the next World Series.
But when we were in the World Series, I watched like three or four innings of a game.
It was long, those three innings.
Like it was like a long stretch of time.
It was baseball year, kind of like dog years, baseball years.
It was a long stretch of time.
And it was amazing, right?
And they won, right?
And then the parade.
Did anybody go to the parade?
Some people, a few of you.
Nobody went to the parade.
Some people didn't go to the parade because I've seen the pictures.
I didn't go.
Not surprising.
People came from all over Georgia.
They drove like three, four, five hours to come to the Braves Parade.
They spent the night in hotels.
They woke up early to line the streets, right?
And most of the parade was pretty good.
But the part that got on the news, do you remember the part that got on the news?
Is where the players, these heroes, our heroes.
Our heroes are on these buses and you know the double decker.
They're up top.
And they're flying by at like 25 miles per hour.
A parade, that's not parade speed.
I know when we say 25, you're like, well, that's still pretty slow.
Not at parade speed.
That's really fast.
They're flying by at 25 miles per hour.
One guy posted this picture, the inside of one of the buses.
That was the inside of one of the buses.
Found that online this week.
It's actually the driver.
So here's what I know.
Some hearts were devastated, right?
Like if you're like a little 12-year-old boy or 11-year-old girl, and you're huge brace, I don't know, 50-year-old man, I don't know.
Maybe you, maybe you're standing there on the side of the street, and like you're gonna see, you're so you're there, you're ready, you woke up early, and then they just fly by and you just whoa, you couldn't even get a picture, right?
Not relational, not humble, not approachable, distant, untouchable.
Lots of powerful people enter in a prestigious way.
Tiger came to the masters in his Gulf Stream G550, okay?
It didn't show up in my 2008 Toyota Forerunner.
It's not what he showed up in.
The G550, I Googled it this morning, about 60 million.
Okay, if you want to go get one, seats 20 people.
So if you have one, I have a family of five.
We'll just take up one little portion.
Won't even know we're there.
You won't know.
Jesus shows up on a donkey.
I mean, he could have shows up, showed up in all the pomp and prestige that he he wanted to.
See, Jesus became lowly for us to not just reverently worship him, which we do, but because he affectionately walks with us.
Let me say that again.
Jesus became lowly.
So it's not just we reverently, fearfully worship him, which we do, but because he affectionately walks with us.
Luke 19, 36.
As he rode along, they spread their cloaks on the road.
As he was drawing near, already on the way down the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, saying, Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.
Peace in heaven and glory in the highest.
So point number two is this through the Spirit and the Word, our expectations of Him transform to knowledge of Him.
We have expectations of God and of Jesus, and they need to transform into knowledge of who He really is.
Now that's not to say we're gonna figure out everything about God.
Part of our growth in grace by the Spirit is to grow in understanding of God, even if it's fractional.
And we're gonna do that by loving and learning the word.
And we let go of all these self-created expectations that we project onto Him.
A few months ago, our family went to the Universal Volcano Bay Water Park in Orlando.
In the middle of the park is this massive volcano.
If you've ever driven through, there it is, that's the volcano.
It's right along the expressway.
If you've ever driven through Orlando, you see this huge, you know, fake volcano over on the side.
Massive, massive.
We've been seeing it for years, and finally we're at the water park, and I had already decided this year if my girls go up that volcano to the body plunge slide.
I am I'm going.
I'm not gonna be the old dad.
I'm going up.
Like I am gonna show up and go up there.
And so, sure enough, my two oldest daughters they head up 125 feet up.
And once you're up there, you climb in a vault.
There's the vault.
That's not me.
Found it on the internet, some random guy.
And you're just looking at 125 feet up.
You're waiting in line, you get a little more and more nervous once you're up there.
There's one lifeguard up there, she controls the whole deal.
You step in, see-through floor.
Thank you very much for that.
Add-on.
I don't trust that at all.
Right?
You just you step through and you're looking down, and then she closes that vault door with one button, she has another button, and it's all like 10-year-olds, and then me, right?
Like that's what's going on here.
And she's, you know, one, she's counting out, and you can, two, three, hits it.
Then you know, the next kid goes in, he's like, hey, eight-year-old little boy, one, two, drops them.
Like, he has no idea.
Next kid goes in, he goes in, he starts freaking out.
She just drops them, doesn't even count.
Brutal.
It was brutal.
Like once they're in, like, then oldest daughter goes in.
One, two, three.
She's gone.
Hope she lived.
You don't know where she went, right?
You have no idea.
Next daughter goes in, right?
And I'm like, well, if she goes, I'm going.
Like, this is my only chance of not going is that she backs out, and I'm like, well, I gotta walk down with you, you know.
So she that then she goes, I couldn't believe I couldn't believe it that she did it.
Like, but but once you're in there, lifeguard's got you.
Like, you don't you don't have a you don't have a chance at this.
And she goes, boom, right?
Like, gone.
Who knows where she went.
And we could create expectations of the lifeguard.
We all are, as we're like our turns showing up, is you're like, you're you're thinking, like, she's gonna drop me on three, like she's gonna be nice to me, she'll she'll do that.
But like we could create expectations for her, but it's very clear this relationship, like we are the recipient.
She is in she is in charge, she's in charge.
In I climb, and I climb in, clear floor, thing closes, and then she just nothing, like she's just letting me sweat it out in there.
One, two, three, four, five.
I'm I'm looking at her like, what, like what?
Boom, come on, like right.
And I'm like, I mean, she has done that so many times, the dabs, right?
Like, she has that dialed in perfectly.
Perfect.
Whatever my expectations were of her, they were not met, that is for sure, because it was not a very clean, like one, two, three, okay, sweetheart, okay, okay, buddy.
Okay, one, two, three, you know, drop you, right?
No, no, no, no.
Like, and to try to even attempt to hold on to my expectations of her would be silly, really, right?
Because I'm just like, I'm I've created these myself.
Like, she's actually in charge.
And if I want to know, if I actually really wanted to know her and how she does that, and like why she does it, and like over time, how she's like gameplay in that, I would actually need to go and like get to know her.
I can't just project onto her.
I would need to inquire of the lifeguard.
This is why God gives us Jesus, that in Jesus we can begin to understand who God is.
And it's why we have the word, it's why we should learn to love the word and go to the word.
The people on the streets in Luke 19, they're pilgrims that have come into the city for Passover.
They hear this Jesus is coming in, and they think they're projecting onto him their expectations because they're thinking we're gonna get a political deliverance.
Just like King David delivered the Israelites from their enemy.
Now we're gonna line the streets, Jesus is gonna come in, and he's gonna free us from Rome.
We so easily project on to Jesus, but he has his own mission and his purposes that are beyond our comfort.
Very clearly, it's everything we've experienced in our life.
And mostly here in this story, he's coming in to go to the cross, to take on our sin, to give us his righteousness, to bring us into relationship with the Heavenly Father, secured by His word for us, not our word for Him.
Two common false expectations I thought of this week.
False expectation number one, because I love God, God will make everything comfortable and prosperous.
I probably believe that more than I want to admit.
Has anybody been let down by that false expectation?
Like even this week, you ever been let down by that one?
That's just not true.
False expectation number two.
Because I am good and I perform, God then loves me.
We talk about this all the time in our church.
We see it in the Pharisees.
If I obey all the law, if I get my act together just right, then God will forgive me.
But He dies on the cross for sinners while they're sinners.
And for us.
And we're never obedient enough and never put together enough, we've never performed enough, and pretending certainly doesn't work.
We need God's word for us on the cross.
We need it.
So what does this mean for your life?
Maybe here are a few thoughts, just three ideas.
Christ as humble king means I don't perform for his love, but receive his love.
We are in a position of restful receiving.
God humbles himself to pursue us in his love, and we are freed from performance orientation and shame motivation faith as our faith is in his word for us.
Number two, Christ as humble king means I don't have to be the king of my heart or my world.
It means there's an authority outside of yourself.
We are creations to a creator.
I'm free from trying to have to control everything, then I will be at peace.
Rather, I can seek my peace that even while I'm a mess and my world is not perfect, I still have a God who's at work.
And the story's not over.
And we have a home, like we just prayed.
We have a home that we are headed toward that is not this world.
Number three, Christ as humble king means I may not understand everything about God, but in Jesus I know God is compassionate and gentle.
Right?
We're not going to understand everything about God.
Why would we even pretend to?
It wouldn't be very exciting.
But in Jesus, we can begin to understand God's regard of us.
He's compassionate, he's gentle.
Luke 19, verse 39.
And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, Teacher, rebuke your disciples.
He answered, I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.
Last point, point number three.
We are called into the joy of worshiping God.
Luke said, Not only will God's people worship, but if they ceased, if we ceased, that God doesn't all of a sudden get fidgety.
Oh no.
No, like even the creation is crying out worship to him, giving worth to him.
We are called as his children in relationship with him and worship, which gives meaning.
You know, like your cubicle job.
It's just, you know, you won't pull your hair out, right?
Or your drive down the expressway.
All the parts of our life that can feel so purposeless, the call to worship can bring purpose into it.
That our lives were called and meant for worship.
We have a purpose even beyond how much money we have or how much we can earn or what our giftedness is or what relationships we have.
We are called to be worshipful children.
Now, back to Hebrews 4.15.
I read the verse earlier.
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness.
So the positive way to say it, Christ sympathizes with you.
The word sympathize is the idea of with suffering.
Jesus is drawn and moves toward our weakness.
He welcomes us while we're weak.
He loves us while we're weak.
He works in us while we're weak.
That means your loneliness and your pain and your frustration and even our own sin does not separate us from his love for us.
He's actually drawn to that weakness.
He's with us.
There's a story a few days after Jesus enters Jerusalem.
He's having the feast of the Passover with his disciples.
We call it the Last Supper.
And at that supper, Christ, God in flesh, he gets up from the table.
Do you remember what he does?
He puts a towel around his waist and he begins to wash the disciples' feet.
He takes on the role of a servant, a slave.
So he comes into the city, comes into the city lowly and humble, comes to a meal with his disciples, and he takes on the role of servant.
There's a scene that hit me this week, John 13, 23.
Hebrew scholar Eugene Peterson, he paints the picture and imagery this way in the message Bible.
One of the disciples, the one Jesus loved dearly, was reclining against him, his head on his shoulder.
Isn't that a beautiful image to think about?
I mean, it kind of feels a little odd if you think about a 30-year-old man and a 20-year-old man, you know, and the 20-year-old guy has his head on the 30-year-old guy's shoulder.
It's not like a small group, I'm interested in attending.
It just feels weird to me.
But if you think about it in terms of you're at the end of yourself, and you and somebody hugs you.
Or you think about it in terms of you're so comfortable with somebody that you fall asleep.
And you just say you fall asleep.
You ever been on a plane, you get super comfortable, and you you know you're leaning over on buddy next to you all of a sudden, you know, oh sorry.
You know, like if you think about it in that way, it starts to make a little more sense.
This is Andre del Castagno's The Last Supper of Christ with St.
John, painted in 1447.
It's an interesting painting because we have John next to Jesus there in the middle, and a peaceful rest.
And then we have Judas right in front of the table, just in a kind of rigid, uncomfortable posture.
Right?
Like Judas has something to hide.
John has nothing to hide.
Right?
He's so at peace and comfortable with this Jesus.
John has something figured out.
I mean, this this guy later writes in 1 John that God is love.
There's no fear.
We see it here, don't we?
It made me think of the image that we looked at two weeks ago, Charles Macasee's the prodigal son.
Remember, this is Macasey's image for that rebel son, broken, beaten, worn and weary, being embraced by that loving, running father, the father who runs toward the son, embraces him.
I think this is actually a lot like the John and Jesus imagery that John 13, 23 is painting for us.
Not so much buddy to buddy, but like child to father.
Right?
The person in the place that we can finally rest.
The place we finally find forgiveness and righteousness and welcome and acceptance.
So let me close as I did two weeks ago.
Two weeks ago I closed with the writing that Macassie did behind his painting, The Prodigal Daughter.
Let me close this week reading the writing behind that one, The Prodigal Son.
Here's what Macasee wrote.
I'll read this in closing.
I think this John understood this.
It's our story.
It's John's story, it's our story.
It's everybody's story.
This is the story of the prodigal son.
It should really be called the running father.
Who waited every day for his boy to return.
The boy who had rejected him so badly.
And finally, when he saw him from a long way off, his father ran to him and hugged him and kissed him.
Let's pray together.
God, thank you for your word that reveals to us who you are and what you have done for us.
Thank you for the gift of Jesus this Palm Sunday.
Forgive us for our expectations that we project onto you.
May we accept who you are for us as our very forgiveness and our very righteousness, our security, our union with you.
Thank you that you are a God of mercy and love and welcome and acceptance.
Help us to be children called into even greater trust and greater worship.
In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.